


Extraction

by achillese



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Post-Hell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-01
Updated: 2013-05-01
Packaged: 2017-12-10 03:46:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/781402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/achillese/pseuds/achillese
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Out of the fire, all they can do is walk. Michael follows the leader.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Extraction

They walked. Their feet carried their weary bodies across black pavement, following nothing, heading nowhere in particular. They simply walked.

Fire marked the place where they’d emerged from the ground together and scorched the earth with marks that would never fade. They didn’t look back at the wreckage, didn’t dare, but merely trekked on.

Michael walked following Adam’s shadow and said nothing, because saying nothing meant that Adam was allowed to pretend the archangel wasn’t there. He would grant Adam that luxury as often as he could, because he deserved it. He deserved loneliness.

They stopped at a diner for dinner when the sun began to set. Adam and Michael sat across from each other at a booth and each had an order of chicken noodle soup and a simple burger with fries. Adam took the bread off his burger and ate the meat and condiments with a fork and knife.

They left before paying for the bill, but Adam decidedly shook some of the ash off his jacket and onto the tabletop as thanks.

They walked by moonlight, passing the mile markers on the highway slowly. Adam announced each number as they reached them. He marked their progress.

—

Adam refused the opportunity to sleep during the night, and when the sun rose they were still walking. The boy hot-wired a car parked at a gas station and they began to drive. Adam’s thin fingers clutched the steering wheel and he refused to let Michael take the wheel, or go below 70 miles per hour.

When the car ran out of gas they walked until they found another car to steal.

Adam always drove.

—

There was no “where” and Adam never gave Michael a “why.” There was only the driving, the long line of stolen cars and stretches of road left behind them.

They did stop every night so Adam could sleep, and they continued to stop at out-of-the-way restaurants and diners to eat.

They had no money, and no purpose. There was no destination. They just drove.

—

“How far?” Michael asked one day, his voice hoarse with disuse.

Adam waited minutes before answering.

“Until it’s enough.”

Michael was afraid to ask what that meant.

The odometer on their latest stolen ride continued to tick. The gas ran out. They slid out of the car together, moving in unison, and began to walk. 

—

They were at another run-down diner when Adam said it:

“I don’t want to find them.”

The syllables were hard and final and Michael couldn’t find a good reason to argue. He nodded and continued to pick at his salad.

Adam stared at him as though waiting for the archangel to ask why not, but when Michael didn’t play along with the script in his head he just got up to use the bathroom. 

Later the waitress spotted them leaving without paying but she didn’t chase after them. They looked like they’d been through enough. 

—

Adam grew tired of being trapped in a car, so they ignored the next parking lot full of cars and continued their way on foot.

The soles on their sneakers have worn thin and Michael soon noticed that Adam had developed a slight limp, but it didn’t matter to Adam because he hadn’t made it far enough yet.

—

When Adam’s limp grew worse, Michael carried him.

It still wasn’t far enough.

—

Michael started stealing cars again so he didn’t have to carry Adam all the time. 

Adam started sleeping more during the drives. Sometimes it took a lot of shaking and shouting for Michael to wake him up. Michael worried. Adam didn’t care. 

He slept more.

—

When Adam breathed his last, Michael abandoned the car in a ditch on the side of the road and spent the night digging a grave with his bare hands. He took off Adam’s jacket but zipped his hoodie up to his chin and lowered his body into the hole, muscles and joints already stiff, and Michael spent more time filling up the grave.

When Michael was done, he folded Adam’s jacket over his arm and continued walking down the road, for the first time without a familiar shadow to follow.

He didn’t go anywhere in particular.

He didn't want to.


End file.
